


Ripper Town

by rowdy_tanner



Category: The Magnificent Seven (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, British Slang, First Meetings, Gen, Historical References, Open alternative universe, Polari, Victorian Attitudes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-22
Updated: 2018-10-21
Packaged: 2019-07-15 13:30:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 12,597
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16064129
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rowdy_tanner/pseuds/rowdy_tanner
Summary: Summary: Victorian London AU: This AU is dedicated to all the wonderful artists that have and do grace this fandom. The Magnificent Seven make their living in quite different ways but when they are called upon to protect those weaker than themselves from a notorious serial killer they once again band together.





	1. An Artist Needs a Muse

**Ripper Town**

 

> by Rowdy Tanner

> Disclaimer: The boys are the property of MGM, Mirisch, and Trilogy Entertainment. I do not own them or make money from them but if I did own them I promise I would share.

> Characters:

> Summary: Victorian London AU: This AU is dedicated to all the wonderful artists that have and do grace this fandom. The Magnificent Seven make their living in quite different ways but when they are called upon to protect those weaker than themselves from a notorious serial killer they once again band together.

> Blame Johnny Depp and the movie  _From Hell_  for this. I've never been to London not even in Victorian times but I pored over a lot of old maps and photographs!

> **Chapter One**

> **An Artist Needs a Muse . . .**

> **London August 1888**

> Buck Wilmington awoke to a dull pounding in his head. Too much ruby port, he thought. Too much absinthe and far too much gin. It was several minutes before he realized that a crisp but continuous knocking at the door was running counterpoint to the banging in his head. Gently disentangling himself from the luscious limbs of his two favorite 'models', Wilmington left the bed to pad across the paint spattered floor of the atelier.

> "Yeah?" he inquired of the peeling woodwork.

> Wilmington wasn't stupid enough to open the door to the rent collector and his minions or indeed anyone else he was in debt to. Blinking his deep blue eyes he raked his hand through his thick dark hair and stroked his mustache as he waited for a reply.

> "Mr. Wilmington?"

> "Who that?" yawned Wilmington.

> "Mah name is Ezra P. Standish and Ah represent The Libertyville Museum of Fine Art."

> "Yeah? You want to buy one of my paintings?"

> "Ah am sure Ah do but first an' foremost would ya be so kind as ta open the doah?"

> Wilmington paused, thinking it over. His paintings sold well. There was an ever increasing market for the ravishingly voluptuous beauties he put on canvas yet his work had never attracted the interest of any other but the private collectors. Sensing the other man's distrust Ezra Standish pushed his engraved business card under the door followed five minutes later by several large denomination banknotes. Upon their receipt Wilmington opened the door with alacrity.

> "Port, Mr. Standish?" he offered the handsome green-eyed man, before finding the bottle empty.

> "A little early in the day for me," replied Ezra, after tactfully reaching into the pocket of his expensive silk vest to consult a gold pocket watch and stepping around Buck's easel to view the large canvas. "Mr. Wilmington, I would very much consider it an honor if you would join me for dinner tonight at my hotel. The menu is very cosmopolitan I do assure you."

> Noting that the other man's accent had faded slightly, Wilmington consulted the stiff business card he held in his hand. "Mr. Standish---"

> "Shall we say at eight o'clock?" Ezra was already halfway out the door, the bed containing two naked women redolent of the strong smell of sex and cheap alcohol, an affront to his southern sensibilities.

> "Eight?"

> "My invitation also includes Mr. Larabee."

> "Larabee?" Now the pieces fell into place and Buck did not care for the picture that they conjured up. "Goodbye," he snapped, hurling both the card and the cash to the floor.

> "Mr. Wilmington---"

> "Get out!" bellowed Wilmington, drawing himself up to his full height of well over six feet tall.

> "Mr. Wilmington," began Ezra, refusing to be intimidated as the irate artist loomed over him threateningly. "Mr. Larabee has refused to put his paintings on public display for the last three years yet I am fully aware that during the elapsed time he has continued to paint sporadically. I wish to speak with Larabee regarding a solo exhibition of his newer work."

> "OUT!" repeated Wilmington.

> "I am talking hundreds of dollars. Tens of hundreds, Mr. Wilmington."

> "OUT!"

> "I know he has money problems caused by the death of his wife and son . . ."

> "OUT!"

> "Mr. Wilmington, the funeral home hasn't been paid. They have removed both the tombstones."

> "What?"

> "Forgive me, I had to ascertain the full extent of Mr. Larabee's money woes."

> "He doesn't know . . ."

> "Quite. The bills and the repeated demands for payment were sent to his former house in the country. I have copies with me," he said reaching inside his red tailored jacket.

> "There is no house left it was burned to the ground!" Buck sank into the brown velvet armchair cradling his head in his hands. Blue eyes full of tears for the wonderful mother and son tragically lost to the best friend he loved like a brother.

> "Mr. Wilmington, an exhibition would solve all Mr. Larabee's problems and set him up for life---"

> "Money will never solve Chris' problems. The man is shattered. His whole reason for living gone up in flames."

> "I am of course speaking of only the practicalities of life."

> "Practically speaking," sneered Buck, "Sarah was more than just his model she was his muse."

> "These recent works . . . how many---"

> "You want to see one?"

> "Why! Indeed yes, sir, I do!"

> Wilmington hauled himself out of the deep seated chair and moved across the room to the armoire. "Here," he said, removing a canvas from its depths.

> Ezra stepped forward eagerly to view the painting. His face paled and he took two steps back as Buck revealed the scene depicted. If black despair and tragic loss could be committed to canvas in oil paints then Ezra was witness to it. In spite of himself Ezra leaned forward and examined the brushwork. Even in the absence of a signature it was a Larabee without a doubt. The artist had matured but the outright violence used in the application of the paint shouted and screamed. The starkness of the subject matter. Clashing violet, shining scarlet and crimson slashed with deep wells of dull black. This was a soul in torment crucifying himself in paint for the viewer. A nightmarish vision of Hell and Damnation. It was a work of true genius.

> "Mr. Wilmington, Chris Larabee is a master, a genius but this is completely unsalable."

> "It isn't for sale!"

> "Have you anything more . . . more conventional?"

> "I have three years worth of this stuff and believe me this is the least frenzied."

> "Was he drunk when he painted this?"

> "Sober. He drinks until he's insensible to stop himself painting the images in his head."

> "I own an earlier Larabee myself. A beautiful herd of wild mustangs . . . Mr. Wilmington, do you realize that if Larabee could paint those horses again with this new life and vigor---"

> "New life?" sneered Wilmington. "This is the end of two lives that tore apart a third. Fathomless sorrow. Death and destruction."

> "Yes, yes, but you must understand," started Ezra irritably, determined not to let this chance slip away, "we are compelled to get Larabee painting again."

> "Good Luck to you. He doesn't intend to ever pick-up a paintbrush again."

> "Where can I find him? Where does he live?"

> "Nowhere. Everywhere. Find an open bottle of absinthe and a brothel and you'll find Christopher Adam Larabee."

> Ezra P. Standish reached inside his finely tailored jacket and pulled out a thick wad of banknotes.

> M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7

> When Buck kicked open the door, Ezra's hand flew upwards to cover his mouth and nostrils. The floor was strewn with bottles and the stench of body odor was eye-watering. Sprawled across the bed in sweat-stained long johns, the blond man didn't stir. With a long sigh Buck grabbed a fistful of clothes off the floor, slung the insensible man over his shoulder and carried him down the rickety stairs to the waiting hansom cab. The cab driver with the pockmarked face whipped up the horse and gladly fled a neighborhood even he didn't feel safe in.

> The hansom cab was only designed to carry two adults in comfort but Larabee's body slid between the two men taking up no more room than a communion wafer.

> "He has a certain fragrance," squeaked Ezra, covering his nose with a large Irish linen handkerchief.

> "He stinks," stated Buck, in a much more down-to-earth tone."Your hotel room? Because he's not welcome at my rooms until he's been fumigated."

> "The Turkish baths," decided Ezra, tapping his silver topped cane on the hatch above his head and bellowing directions to the driver.

> On their arrival Standish instructed the cabbie to wait.

> "Take too long to get him scrubbed even wiv a donkey stone. The peelers will 'ave me run in for loitering, guv," explained the driver, whipping up the horses.

> A gold coin smoothed their way inside the beautiful marble tiled steam baths.

> The tall well-built masseur hurried over. "Are you trying to kill him?" he demanded to know.

> "He needs cleaning up," argued Buck.

> "He needs far more than that," snapped Nathan Jackson. "Leave him with me."

> "With you?" asked Ezra. "For what purpose?"

> "I'll get him clean and relatively sober," promised Nathan, seeing genuine concern in Buck's eyes.

> "You have some medical skill?" demanded Ezra suspiciously.

> "This isn't my only job. I'm a porter at the city infirmary and I work at the mortuary."

> "This man is of value to us. I have no wish to hand him over to a resurrectionist and have him spirited away to some necropolis frequented by bloody surgeons looking to dissect him! I have read about these atrocities."

> Nathan looked at Buck. "Where did you find him?" he asked, nodding his head in Ezra's direction.

> Buck shrugged. "We'll be back later with clean clothes for him. Dispose of what he's wearing now will you? Give them to the poor."

> "Mister, even the poor don't want 'em," Nathan smiled revealing straight white teeth in a strikingly good-looking face.

> The last thing Larabee vaguely recalled was a tall dark man advancing on his prone form bearing a two foot wide natural sponge dripping with soapy water.

> The two men returned with brand new clothes and a few of Larabee's personal items in a much more roomy growler. The driver didn't want to wait but Standish mollified him with the promise of a sovereign. "Consider yourself on hire for the rest of the day."

> "Right O, guv," agreed the driver, doffing his brown hat and pulling his tweed cape coat around himself, prepared to be at Ezra's beck and call.

> Nathan Jackson had a sparkling clean Chris Larabee bundled up in a number of thick, snow white, Turkish towels. Larabee was staring at the floor with bloodshot eyes but he was almost compos mentis. Nathan took the bag containing the clothes and led Larabee away. Returning him fully dressed some time later.

> "Chris? This is Ezra P. Standish, he wants to exhibit your paintings."

> "Don't paint any longer," stated Chris, shaking off Nathan's supporting hand and staggering slightly. "Now, point me in the direction of a bottle or the river Thames, I don't much care which."

> "I have a very fine bottle of brandy back at my hotel," soothed Ezra, "I'd be happy to share it."

> "One bottle?" sneered Larabee, pushing by the two men and heading out of the double doors.

> "Where will he go?" asked Ezra, as he climbed aboard the waiting growler.

> "Back to Hell," sighed Buck.

> The whip cracked and the growler set off at a spanking pace.

> "Whoa," protested Ezra.

> "Seems as if the driver at least knows where Hell is," grinned Buck.

> M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7

> Hell, or its approximation on Earth was apparently the Ten Bells public house in Whitechapel. Chris Larabee was already in the company of three inebriated looking prostitutes, one of whom was particularly tall and answered to the name Long Liz Stride, another was a Mary Jane Kelly, the third had a very pretty face and was known only as Lydia. Lydia, Emily and Nora were known to have a particularly brutal pimp even by Whitechapel standards. Using the name Hezekiah Wickes, he ruled over his particular manor with a gang of thugs not averse to ruthlessly beating anyone, man or woman, standing in their way.

> Also at Larabee's table was a man with a face hewn from granite, a straight-sided pint glass of porter lost in his big hand, wearing a dusty leather apron with a scarred wooden mallet tucked into the deep front pocket.

> The air in the public bar was blue, both with cheap tobacco smoke and colorful obscenities as Buck fought his way to the long bar. Avoiding eye contact with the murderous looking dockers and stevedores staring lustfully at the buxom barmaid, Ezra gazed fixedly at his own reflection in the bevelled mirrors behind beer pumps incongruously decorated with scenes of fox hunting. Ordering glasses of both beer and gin the two men shouldered their way towards Larabee's wood and glass booth.

> On their arrival an astonished Ezra tugged at Buck's sleeve. "Is that Josiah Sanchez? The sculptor?" he hissed.

> "Josiah, you old reprobate, this is Ezra P. Standish," grinned Buck, slapping Sanchez on the back.

> An overawed Ezra handed Josiah Sanchez his business card. Josiah nodded a greeting and pushed the card into his apron pocket without reading it.

> "Now, Chris, will you listen to Mr. Standish?" asked Buck. "He's here to make your fortune and only needs enough new works for an exhibition."

> "No."

> "Chris---"

> "I don't paint any more," snarled Larabee.

> "Mr. Larabee, please listen---" began Ezra.

> Buck shook his head at Ezra. "We'll try again when he's had more to drink."

> Ezra nodded his agreement but didn't feel at all optimistic.

> As the pot boy leaned over the table to fill his tray with empty glasses Buck grabbed the youngster's hand.

> "Hey, keep your hands to yourself, mister! I ain't here to be buggered about with," protested the young man bravely enough but his hazel eyes were full of fear.

> "Where did you get all this ink?" asked Buck, examining one of the boy's colorfully streaked palms.

> "I'm a printer's apprentice," answered J. D. Dunne, swiftly pulling back his hand.

> "Then what are you doing in here? Aren't apprentices forbidden to work elsewhere?"

> "I need extra money for my late ma's debt to the doctor. Not that it's any of your business, mister. I already 'ave a gaffer to answer to." The boy scooped up the dead glasses, pushed jet black hair off his pale forehead and almost ran back to the bar.

> Buck watched him go, a thoughtful look on his face but he was quickly distracted by the commotion over by the double doors. Larabee suddenly pushed aside the poor Unfortunate draped all over him and got to his feet staring intently at the men harassing Nathan Jackson. The troublemakers pushed Nathan into the tiled vestibule and then outside. Larabee rose to his feet and followed them.

> "Where is he going?" asked Ezra.

> "After drinking and fornicating, brawling is his third favorite pastime," groaned Buck.

> "Are you planning on offering Mr. Larabee your assistance? He appeared to be a little outnumbered, Mr. Wilmington."

> "Even Chris isn't stupid enough to take on a gang of cutthroats alone."

> "Are you sure of that?"

> "No," sighed Buck.

> M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7

> In the rain-slicked cobbled street lined with miserable terraced houses the gang dragged Nathan towards a corner gaslight, their intention to hang him from the lamppost's ladder rest clear to all. Twisting the silver horse head top of his ebony black walking cane Larabee walked slowly along the narrow stone pavement. His black Astrakhan coat almost skimming the worn flagstones. A stream of golden light fell across his path as the door of a gin shop opened. Turning his head to the left Larabee observed a man pulling up the collar of his pea jacket before following a path parallel to Larabee's own. The man paused briefly and adjusted the peaked cap covering his long hair as a silent agreement was made between the two men.

> After stacking wooden crates and empty bottles in the pub's backyard J. D. Dunne lifted the latch on the wooden gate and strolled down the dark alley to the corner where the streetwalker with the pretty blonde ringlets, Emily, usually plied her trade.

> Walking in step the two men reached the street corner just as the rope was put around Nathan's neck. His mouth agape JD watched the tense confrontation between the gang's self-appointed gob and the man in the long black coat. The slighter man beside him produced a bludgeon seemingly from nowhere and allowed the thick end to rest in his palm threateningly as angry words were exchanged.

> There was a sudden blur of violent activity and JD watched open-mouthed as the taller blond man unsheathed the wicked sword stick and slashed about him. The flashing blade finding a target every time. JD had never heard of a gent in a silk top hat have at 'em with such cool bravado outside of a penny dreadful.

> Breaking the arm of a man lunging towards him with a long knife the long haired young man in the peaked cap cracked the skull of a second knifeman before bludgeoning two more men in rapid succession.

> JD watched the second man in the wide legged pants use an odd kind of kick, no doubt picked up in Shanghai or some other exotic oriental port, to disable yet another armed man. Then pausing to watch the man in black before producing two eight inch long hooks. Projecting at right angles from the center of wooden handles JD recognized the implements as cargo hooks, suggesting that the man might be a stevedore.

> Everyone heard the shrill sound of a police whistle and the remaining enemy combatants fled. Sparks practically flying from their hobnailed boots.

> "Coppers warning each other not to venture down here 'til we're all pretty much dead. Any soul left breathing gets hauled off to the clink," shrugged the long haired man clearly no stranger to the methods used by the Metropolitan Police Service in order to keep the peace in the East End.

> "Pub?" suggested both men in unison.

> A loud knocking noise distracted Larabee.

> "Coppers," grinned the man in the peaked cap as Larabee raised an inquisitive blond eyebrow.

> The sound of truncheons tapping against walls and iron railings signaling that the police had decided that it was safer to alert any remaining miscreants of their imminent arrival in the vicinity.

> "The rozzers don't expect to find anyone here so would one of you two mind cutting me loose?" huffed Nathan.

> The long haired man obliged with a shiv that almost gave Larabee's sword stick an identity crisis.

> "Name's Chris. Mariner?" asked Larabee.

> "Vin Tanner. Was a whaler. Working as a docker, a longshoreman, now."

> Nathan followed the two men back to the Ten Bells. Once inside the three men ordered more drink before returning to Larabee's booth now populated with a number of common prostitutes, including Annie Chapman, Catherine Eddowes and Mary Ann "Polly" Nichols. In Larabee's absence Buck had opened his hard backed sketchbook, pulled a pencil from behind his ear and was now drawing Mary Jane Kelly.

> "He with you?" asked Buck as Tanner found a seat across from Chris.

> Grabbing Buck's sketchbook and pencil Chris studied Tanner's face before rapidly moving the pencil over the paper.

> Buck opened his mouth to protest but could only gape as Tanner removed the peaked cap revealing long, softly curling hair. Ezra gasped as a pair of azure eyes glanced across the table at them. Both men had seen more than their fair share of beautiful faces illustrated in pencil, ink and oil but this face would make a Renaissance artist weep for joy. Josiah Sanchez was laughing as indeed tears ran down his cheeks. Tanner had more than mere beauty, he had something that made it impossible to look away from his mobile features.

> Totally unaware that he had poleaxed the four men, Tanner scratched his stubbled chin and then drained his pint glass. Chris hurriedly tore out his first sketch leaving it to float to the floor, rummaged in his pocket for a stick of charcoal and began another portrait.

> "You ever give a threepenny upright, dearie?" Annie asked Tanner.

> "N-no," blushed Tanner.

> "Pity," giggled the covey of backstreet whores.

> "With them mince pies you'd coin it in, ducky," laughed Annie.

> "Mince pies is rhyming slang for eyes," hissed Buck.

> Ezra elbowed Buck and inclined his head towards Larabee. "He's inspired," hissed Ezra, reaching down to collect the discarded sketch and marveling at the vibrant likeness caught in only a few pencil strokes.

> Buck nodded. A tear forming in his eye too as he watched his best friend come back from the dead.

> M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7

> Tanner was persuaded to accept another pint of beer from Ezra then he rose from the table to say farewell. "A few hours sleep afore work starts for me."

> Ezra cleared his throat. "Mr. Tanner, may I offer you employment of a less arduous kind?"

> The women laughed and pulled Tanner back down into his seat.

> "Don't sell your bonnie arse to the bugger for just a farthing, ask plenty. Make 'im pay for the room for the whole night too," whispered Catherine Eddowes conspiratorially, "and we'll join you after he's gone."

> "Ask at least a tanner for a Tanner," giggled Annie, spilling gin all down her cheap skirts and moth-eaten woolen shawl.

> "I'd pay you a sixpenny piece myself," snickered Polly, squeezing the top of his thigh.

> "When was the last time you had a tanner to spare?" scoffed Mary Jane, nudging Polly in the ribs.

> "Mr. Tanner, I did not mean anything like that---" began a ruffled Ezra. "I'll pay you to sit and pose for a painting. Nothing more, I do assure you."

> "Hell naw," blushed Tanner, trying to disentangle himself from the women.

> "A guinea! Two guineas if you want 'im in just a smile!" negotiated Liz Stride on Tanner's behalf but the young stevedore was long gone.

> "Polly, you scared the pretty boy so badly 'e ran off!" teased Catherine.

> Polly shuffled over to sit next to Ezra staring so intently at Ezra's gold tooth that he felt as if he'd been assayed.

> Larabee was the next to depart, leaving behind a disappointed Lydia and a half full glass of drink on their table. A small action which caused Buck to smile. Next to leave was Polly Nichols. Everyone else leisurely drained their glasses before leaving.

> TBC


	2. Grapes, Jellied Eels and a Murder

**Grapes, Jellied Eels and a Murder.**

> > > **London August 1888**

> Tanner blushed and prepared himself for a ribbing from the other dockers when he saw the elegantly dressed blond man in the tall hat waiting at the dock gates.

> "Larabee," greeted Tanner, as his workmates walked by wolf-whistling.

> The two men fell into step as they walked along the narrow flagged pavement. Carefully avoiding the hunched over figure scavenging in the rubbish filled gutters the two men enjoyed the bright, fine day.

> "Banana?" offered Tanner, noting that the other man's green eyes were clear and bright. Also that he was wearing a new collar and was clean-shaven.

> Larabee looked surprised but accepted the perfect yellow fruit.

> "Damaged goods, fresh off the boat this morning," drawled Tanner.

> "Fresh off the boat? then shouldn't they be green?" smiled back Larabee, as he realized that the fruit had to have already spent time ripening in one of the glass banana warehouses.

> "Grapes?" laughed Tanner, reaching into his outside pockets.

> "More damaged goods?"

> "As your Mr. Standish would say, dockers' perquisites."

> "Perks?"

> "Black or white?" offered Tanner.

> Larabee accepted the juicy black grapes. "Anything else?" he chuckled.

> "What ya needing?"

> Larabee shook his head. "I'll let you know," he said. "You smell of smoke."

> "Yeah," sighed Vin, "helped out damping down the fire on the dry dock an' clearing the rubble. It was bad down there. Ain't got no other clean working clothes."

> "Hard physical work on the docks."

> "We carry the cargo off on our backs or barrows all for five pennies an hour. Word is there will be a dock strike if we don't get the 'dockers' tanner' wage rise we's asking for, soon. At least it's better than blood alley."

> "Blood alley?"

> "Sugar. Tears up your hands 'til they're bleeding. The sacks hang up in what we call blood alley."

> Reaching inside the long black coat Larabee pulled out his own sketchbook. Tanner politely wiped his hands on his red spotted neckerchief before he carefully turned over the pages. Page after page his own face stared up at him. In pen and ink, chalk and charcoal, pencil too.

> "All day long ya drawed me?"

> "I was wondering if you might to agree to sit for me on Sunday? I can promise you payment for your time and a good meal."

> "Where?"

> "What?"

> "Heard from the women that you move around some. . . ."

> "I took a nice, fully furnished, house today. A pleasant avenue, all the children playing out had a cap and a pair of boots. Would you care to see the rent book?" asked Larabee, as they came to a stop outside the gin shop he remembered from the night before. "You live here?"

> "Upstairs in the back room an' none of the children that play in the gutter 'ave boots or a cap to call their own," said Tanner, as he was surrounded by children clamoring for whatever he had in his deep inside pockets.

> Larabee watched as each happy child left with an apple or half an orange and he suddenly felt guilty for eating the banana as one small boy had to make do with a large potato.

> "You shouldn't have let me eat the banana."

> "Naw, guess not an' that potato were for my tea."

> "Really?"

> "Little Sean loves raw potato," grinned Tanner. "Don't look so crestfallen, I always bring him one home. It might be all he has to eat except a fish head or tail 'til I get home tomorrow."

> "No breakfast?"

> "Larabee, none of these children get breakfast," sighed Tanner.

> "I'd pay you well," repeated Larabee. "It would be up to you to choose what to do with the money."

> "I'll think on it some."

> "Over food?"

> "Pie, plenty green liquor an' mash? Or jellied eels?"

> "What are jellied eels?"

> "Freshwater eels chopped, boiled in water an' vinegar with some lemon and nutmeg forming a sort of jelly---"

> Larabee, his stomach queasy at the very thought, interrupted to suggest an alternative bargaining tool. "Beer?"

> "Never had you down as yellow, Larabee," chuckled Tanner.

> "I have to pick my fights carefully these days!"

> "Mutton pie, with a parsley sauce and mashed potatoes?" relented Tanner.

> Relieved, Larabee nodded quickly and fell into step with his friend.

> M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7

> On entering the "Pie and Mash shop" Larabee was surprised by the gleaming white wall tiles, shining mirrors and marble-topped tables.

> "Fairly new shop." Tanner told him as they sat down to partake of the food. "They used to serve this kind of food from carts on street corners."

> "This pie is good," Larabee conceded.

> "Want to try some of my jellied eels? Puts hairs on your chest and it's very good for your...endurance."

> "Buck might be in need of something to keep up his stamina but I certainly don't need any help, thanks," smirked Larabee taking out his sketchbook and trying to catch the look of pleasure on the face of his dining partner as he tucked into his bowl of jellied eels.

> M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7

> A little later Larabee and Tanner met Wilmington and Standish in the street.

> "Jus' showing Larabee where the Ten Bells pub is," grinned Tanner.

> "Then we'd better follow you, we wouldn't want him to get lost!" laughed Wilmington.

> The pub's hubbub hushed as the four men came through the door and striding across the bare wooden boards headed for Larabee's usual table.

> "It's Polly," sobbed Annie Chapman. "They done her in."

> "Gin?" offered Larabee.

> "Thank you," answered Liz Stride. "You're a prince among men," she added as the glasses of gin arrived at their table via JD's wooden tray.

> The violent death of a prostitute was hardly an unusual occurrence. The killing of Polly Nichols was the third reported murder since April. The East End was noted for its violent pimps and bloodthirsty gangs of blade-wielding cutthroats.

> "She left right after you left here, Mister Larabee. They found her in Buck's Row, throat cut an' her poor body all ripped open," continued Long Liz Stride.

> Nathan Jackson spied them across the smokey room and joined them.

> "Stop telling it like that!" cried Annie.

> "It was indeed gruesome," Nathan muttered to the men at the table. "I was in the mortuary when they brought the body in. Worst thing I ever saw come in there and that's saying a lot."

> "Ahem," the short, fair-haired man in the herringbone Ulster coat accompanied by a man with a face like a busted knuckle, cleared his throat to attract their attention before identifying himself. "Police Inspector Walter Bryce. I understand that you, Mr. Larabee, was the last person to see Polly Nichols alive."

> "No," said Tanner softly. "The last person to see her alive would most likely be the murderer."

> "Vin Tanner, the man who is a total stranger to the inside of a barber's shop, isn't it? I know all about you. Wanted in Nantucket for the murder of Jess Kincaid, captain of the whaling ship, Tascosa."

> "I never thought being acersecomic was a legitimate sign of guilt," yawned Ezra.

> "Elijah Josephs, the first mate, did him in not me."

> "You were found with the dead body in the captain's cabin. Bang to rights, I call it."

> "Weren't where he was killed. Cabin were too small fer him ta be kilt with the harpoon that they said I done it with. Ya know how long a harpoon is? He were murdered up on deck, only place on the ship with room to swing a cat, where Eli Joe were."

> "See? 'E don't really care if a poor girl is dead! Just another Unfortunate to 'im! One less to put in the Black Maria an' 'ave up in front of the beak!" sobbed Annie. "'Er just trying to earn an 'onest living an' keep body an' soul together!"

> Buck put his arm around her shoulders.

> "There don't take on so," soothed Long Liz, emptying both glasses of gin. "She needs another glass of mother's ruin she does."

> Ezra immediately obliged with another round of gin.

> "Jackson isn't it?" continued Bryce, clearly determined to antagonize every man at the table. "Escaped slave I hear?"

> "Even back home slavery was over years ago," glowered Nathan.

> Disgusted, the police sergeant accompanying Bryce rolled his eyes.

> "Larabee? Where did you go after leaving the pub?" asked Bryce.

> "He slept on my floor, Inspector," answered Buck.

> Flipping it open, Bryce referred to his small black notebook. "But you didn't leave here until later, Mr. Wilmington."

> "Hell's bells if ya know where we all was. Why ya askin'?" snarled Tanner.

> "Details, Tanner. The foundation of good police work."

> "Any more questions may be directed to Mr. Larabee's attorney," interjected Ezra.

> "Solicitor," grinned Buck, as Bryce looked nonplussed.

> "I shall pencil a notation in my notebook recording the fact that you have no alibi for the time this ghastly murder was occurring, Mr. Larabee. The fact will then be included in my report to my superiors." Bryce snapped the notebook closed and returned it to his inside pocket.

> "Ta-ta," said Long Liz imperiously waving him away.

> Watching Inspector Bryce leave they ordered yet more drinks and Chris Larabee passed his almost full sketchbook across the table to a smiling Ezra Standish.

> "I'm going to be needing a few more of these," Larabee said.

> TBC

> > 


	3. Grape Stalks and an Arrest

> **Chapter Three**

> **Grape Stalks and an Arrest**

> > **London September 1888**

> The day was bright and clear as Tanner's hob-nailed boots made short work of the walk to one of London's more leafy neighborhoods. He paused outside the gate of the garden-fronted villa Larabee had rented. Ezra's money clearly at work. It was far grander than any house Tanner had entered since arriving in London and he felt a little out of place in his work clothes even though he had given them a good beating against the wall out in the tiny backyard. He was sure that lace curtains were twitching in windows all along the road. Tanner could feel several pairs of eyes peering over potted aspidistras as he walked up the black and white tiled pathway and a wave of disapproval when he used the heavy brass knocker on the wooden front door instead of continuing round the back to the tradesman's entrance.

> The door opened with such alacrity that Vin wondered if Chris had been standing right behind it for the last hour or more.

> "Housemaid's day off," grinned Chris. "Come in."

> Vin stepped inside and wiped his feet on the coir mat. Larabee solemnly took his navy pea jacket from him and found a hook for it on the mirrored hallstand.

> "Pretty fancy, Cowboy," smirked Tanner, noting the fine plaster work corbels and deep detailed skirting boards.

> "Don't call me Cowboy," glared Larabee, leading the way up the carpeted stairs to the studio.

> The room was full of airy light and Tanner relaxed a little. "Where do you want me?" he winked, a mischievous glint in his bright blue eye.

> "Here." Larabee pointed to a chair carefully positioned to allow the light to fall on the subject from numerous angles.

> Tanner complied and tried not to fidget as Larabee prowled the room sketchbook and pencil in hand. Finally satisfied Larabee moved his easel an inch to the right and began work on the prepared canvas. Tanner breathed in linseed oil, white spirit, paint and varnish.

> "Slump in the chair and tilt your chin slightly upwards. Yes, that's it." ordered Larabee, pausing to smile reassuringly at Tanner causing the nervous expression to change on the subject's face.

> Only the fading light brought a halt to the proceedings a number of hours later. After cleaning his brushes as Tanner stretched, his back cracking loudly, Larabee threw a cloth over the canvas before turning to lead the way back down the stairs.

> "Can I see?" asked Tanner.

> Larabee shrugged. "It isn't finished," he warned.

> Tanner was still curious to see the painting. Larabee was right of course it wasn't finished. The background and immediate foreground were still swathes of neutral wash. But it was unlike anything Tanner had ever seen outside of his own shaving mirror. Larabee had caught the image of Vin Tanner perfectly. Luminous blue eyes the exact shade of his own sparkled mischievously back at him. Slight stubble gave the sun bronzed skin tones a masculinity that prevented the generous rose-tinted lips from appearing too feminine. Yet a captured feyness pervaded the portrait. An ancient knowingness.

> "Cowboy," breathed Tanner. "You can sure draw."

> M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7

> It was late and after a wholesome meal that left both men feeling full Larabee offered Tanner a bed for the night.

> "I haven't laid a fire in the spare room so it might be somewhat chilly in there but there are plenty of extra blankets and an eiderdown."

> "Hell, I could sleep on a rope tonight," yawned Tanner.

> Seeing Larabee's puzzled look he elaborated. "They stretch rope across the room and you pay to lean on it and sleep. At least you're indoors and not on the streets in the wind and rain."

> "You've been that tired?"

> "Yep. Preferred it to sharing a bed with a stranger when I had only a few farthings in my pocket. Luckily for me dockside work can be got without a Character."

> "A Character?"

> "A recommendation, usually written down in the form of a letter. You get all kinds standing on the stones. Accused murderers, cutthroats and men wanted for all sorts of crimes."

> "I see."

> "But ain't easy to git set on regular 'til the gaffers know your face down there. Picked up a day here and there fer a backhander, got known as a good hand not a skiver."

> "A backhander? You had to pay a bribe to get a day's work?"

> Vin grinned. "Let it be known I'd fight my corner too. So when the boss say it was 'tween me an' another fella fer the regular number had to let the other bloke know I'd be the one takin' the job."

> "I just bet you did," chuckled Larabee.

> "Ain't hurt him much jus' broke his nose some. Now I got enough pay to settle up with folk on a Saturday night."

> Soon they began spending the odd day out together too. The painting nearing its culmination but Larabee losing the sense of urgency he formerly had in the completion of it. Especially as Ezra had already found a buyer for it sight unseen.

> Although Larabee had already spent some time alone in London, wandering the streets with Tanner opened his eyes to seeing the city with new sense of wonder.

> Tanner walked Larabee along Whitechapel Road to point out the shop where The Elephant Man had been exhibited before taking Larabee across the road to the London Hospital to briefly meet with Joseph Carey Merrick himself. Tanner explained that he and Merrick had previously met in Antwerp and he'd seen to it that Merrick had safely boarded a ferry there.

> After the two men had viewed the Palace of Westminster in all its pomp an impishly grinning Tanner led Larabee down narrow streets to the Whitechapel Bell Foundry. The very foundry responsible for the casting of the giant bell known as "Big Ben" that graced St. Stephen's tower that housed the famous clock, opened its doors to them. Giving Larabee a glimpse into a darkened world of men toiling at the bell tables and pits in the sulfurous heat and hellishly deafening noise.

> Tanner had an uncanny knack for taking Larabee to visit sights and locations that awoke the slumbering artist in his soul. Larabee never dare leave his now bulging sketchbook at home when Tanner got that mischievous gleam in his eye.

> **Friday September 1888**

> It was a clear evening with only a scattering of fine showers as they headed towards Spitalfields. Larabee feeling curious never having actually seen such a notorious rookery. Walking along Wentworth Street both men smirked at the coppers entirely too scared to venture along this notorious thoroughfare unless they were in pairs. They watched the hawkers, a juggler, the organ-grinder with his flea-bitten monkey, the mincing caterwaulers offering their bodily pleasures for a price and insolent beggars screaming bloody blue murder if no coin was thrown their way. A street-corner preacher bellowing fire and brimstone at the heathen crowd enduring in his turn a blasphemous barracking from two drunken costermongers.

> Avoiding the pickpocketing dips of all ages, sexes and sizes. The constant screaming and yelling that cruelly assailed the ears. The fighting in the street. Men knocking seven bells out of their fellow man, women shrieking and clawing at other women like vicious alley cats and the men punching women and the wives kicking their husbands when they were down. Precious moments of brief silence punctuated by the crying of sickly children and wailing old women.

> The rank rotting smell of the dark narrow alleys and Stygian backstreets. Sulfurous flickering lamps barely penetrating the infernal gloom where devils and red-eyed demons lay in wait for the innocent and the not so guiltless.

> Chris smiled and nodded at the less-raddled prostitutes that greeted him by name. While Vin shyly ducked his head at some of the more graphic offers loudly made him. Some older tarts with sloppy inattentive pimps even offering to service him for free when they realized that they could still bring a rosy blush to his handsome face. Although he'd sailed the Seven Seas Vin was obliged to admit that the East End whores were the most audaciously brazen he had ever encountered having no shame when advertising their particular talents.

> They entered the Ten Bells pub and shouldered their way through the drinkers to reach the usual table. Vin's sharp ears picked up the comments made about Josiah who was wearing his leather apron in spite of the press reports referring to a suspect connected with the Polly Nichols' murder case also wearing such an apron.

> Some of the "fallen women" sitting with Buck and Josiah had attended Polly's funeral at Little Ilford Cemetery with the two men. Grateful that Buck had paid for a growler to take them all there Buck and Josiah were being treated to the women's company for the entire evening.

> JD had delivered a tray of beer in straight-sided glasses to their table before Larabee and Tanner had even sat down. As the pot-boy turned away he was almost trampled to death by a baker's dozen of costermongers, their Kingsman neckerchiefs proudly tied around their necks, accompanied by a few fishmongers from Billingsgate fish market.

> "Hey, Leather Apron," challenged the group's leader. "Where was you on the night Polly was ripped?"

> "With these fine gentleman, brother," replied Josiah.

> "Gentlemen," sneered one of the costermongers.

> As the group charged the table, attempting to seize Josiah, Vin surged to his feet and threw one punch connecting perfectly with the leader's jaw but the four men at the table were dangerously outnumbered and encumbered by the table and bentwood chairs.

> Ezra Standish, keen to check on the progress of his investment in Chris Larabee, side-stepped a muttering wild-eyed man in dark clothes shaking his fist at the sky and sauntered through the pub doors pausing to tip his hat with a silver-topped cane in salute to the two prostitutes huddled under the pub sign. As a burly costermonger was hurled in his direction by an irate Josiah roaring like an enraged bull, Ezra clobbered Josiah's victim on the head with his cane before cheerfully wading into the pell-mell before him cracking heads left and right.

> Ezra was followed into the public house by a gang of stevedores who spying one of their own being dragged backwards over a table and a gleam of sharpened metal slicing through the air they too dived into the battle royal. Vin fought loose of his armed assailant and beat his man to the ground. The tide now turning in the other direction the costermonger's leader dragged his fallen comrades to their feet and wisely retreated to the opposite side of the taproom to lick their wounds in disgruntled silence.

> Vin picked Ezra's hat up out of the detritus on the wooden floor. "Here's yer titfer, Ezra."

> Ezra noticed Vin trying not to wince as he straightened up.

> Nathan Jackson arrived just in time to see both Vin and Buck righting their table while trying to hide nicks and cuts. Frowning he ignored Vin's protests and bandaged a cut on his arm with his own handkerchief while Josiah and Ezra found just enough unbroken chairs to sit on.

> Nathan looked around suspiciously noting the costermongers glaring daggers at the stevedores. "I didn't know that they put sawdust on the floor in here?"

> "That's what is left of the furniture. Bottoms up!" grinned Vin, holding up his glass as JD served the triumphant stevedores with glasses of beer and gin courtesy of Ezra's wallet.

> Several beers later Vin announced that he was tired and rose to leave first. Chris waved a working girl named Lydia over and they followed him out. Nathan and Ezra said goodbye to Buck and Josiah next. JD's work lasted well into the early hours.

> > **Saturday September 1888**

> On a bright Saturday morning Annie Chapman's body was discovered at six a.m. near the doorway of 29 Hanbury Street. Later seven men were to be found in the Ten Bells pub. The scuttlebutt already had it that "Leather Apron" had struck again.

> "The sooner the killer gets buckled the better," muttered Buck Wilmington.

> "Arrested," explained JD, noting Ezra's puzzled expression.

> "Folks living nearby are charging a penny a look. They say from the houses across the yard ya can see the bloody murder scene," rasped Vin.

> "Ghoulish," shuddered Ezra.

> "Don't look now," said JD leaving the table in a hurry as a familiar figure entered the pub.

> "I now understand that you, Mr. Christopher Adam Larabee, was the last person to see the victim alive. You fit the description too," accused Police Inspector Walter Bryce.

> "I do?" asked Larabee.

> "Genteel is the description given of the man last seen talking to the whore," said Bryce.

> "Shabby-genteel with dark hair was, so I am given to understand, the actual description given. As you can see markedly not the appearance of Mr. Larabee," pointed out Josiah.

> "The lady had a name, Annie Chapman, I suggest you remember to use it or else," growled Buck.

> "Is that a threat? Are you threatening a serving Police Inspector? A respected servant of Her Majesty the Queen?" blustered Bryce.

> "Respected my 'arse'," laughed Vin.

> "Inspector Bryce, I am quite sure that Buck's remark wasn't a threat," soothed Ezra.

> "No," agreed Buck, "it was a promise."

> "Mr. Christopher Adam Larabee, I see from my previous notes that you had no alibi for the murder of Mary Ann Nichols," began Bryce consulting his black notebook. "I wish you to accompany me to the Police Station in Whitechapel's H division," said Bryce.

> "Why? Ain't ya gotten friends of yer own?" sneered Vin.

> "Watch your mouth, Tanner! I'll arrest you too. Where were you, Tanner, when Mary Ann Nichols was murdered?"

> "Damping down the fire on Shadwell Dry Dock all night. You can check that with the other dockers down there, if you dare accuse one of their own?"

> "I recall that you smelled of smoke that day," added Larabee.

> "I-I think I had best arrest you all anyway!"

> "Do so, if you are prepared to explain your actions to the American Ambassador to the Court of St. James," snapped Ezra, rightly assuming that the wild threat would be enough to make Bryce back down.

> "Don't any of you leave the country!" ordered Bryce striding out of the pub almost deafened by the jeering laughter.

> "He still hasn't noticed my leather apron," guffawed Josiah.

> "Or that I have some 'medical' knowledge," pointed out Nathan.

> "Or the fact that we are all bladed!" mocked Buck. "There will be more killings if they don't get someone better on the case. I hear that they even questioned some of your Indian friends, Vin?"

> "Yeah but he was totally innocent so they had to let Black Elk go back to the Wild West Show lickety split."

> "Do we think that it is the same killer?" asked Josiah.

> "The wounds I saw on both of the two victims have striking similarities," pointed out Nathan. "He cuts their throats from left to right first. The police think he has medical knowledge because of the mutilations, however, I don't really think that he has. But yes, I think it is the same killer."

> "He could be a butcher? Or a slaughter man?" suggested Josiah.

> "He's certainly that," growled a deeply saddened Buck. "Those poor working girls."

> "We'll watch each others' backs and keep our eyes open for anyone acting suspiciously. If any of the women need our help we'll give it," decided Larabee.

> The other men added their nods of solemn agreement.

> M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7

> All seven of the friends attended the burial of Annie Chapman at Manor Park Cemetery a few days later.

> "George Lusk has been elected president of the Whitechapel Vigilance Committee," commented Nathan, afterward in the Ten Bells public house.

> "They arrested 'Leather Apron'," said Josiah.

> "And yet here you are," smirked Ezra.

> "Saw the fella they've arrested helping out at the Shadwell Dry Dock fire," mused Vin, drinking more than usual. "So they'll be forced to cut him loose."

> "Some people insist that the Royal family are involved. A carriage with a Royal crest has been reportedly seen hereabouts," sighed Nathan.

> "There's a hundred pound reward, more money than I've ever seen," JD informed them. "Rumor is they'll ask the Home Secretary to add to it."

> "Yeah, like they'll care about the Unfortunates walking the streets. It won't ever happen," sneered Buck.

> "Like I said we'll help any way we can," stated Chris, noticing Vin ordering more drinks. It wasn't like Vin to drink spirits.

> "A series of patrols?" suggested Josiah.

> "Josiah just wants ta preach ta them gals," snickered Vin. "Iffen you're saving fallen women you can save me one!"

> "You've had enough to drink, Tanner," glared Chris.

> "No, we'd scare away their trade an' they wouldn't thank us," Buck warned.

> "The Metropolitan Police have already increased the coppers on the beat. We could be nabbed as pimps too," added Nathan.

> "Nabbed?" queried Ezra.

> "Arrested," clarified Josiah.

> "But you're right, Chris, we need to do something," insisted Buck banging his fist down on the rickety table.

> "What do you suggest?" countered Chris while resting a calming hand on Buck's shoulder.

> "I could pay them then they could stay home," offered Ezra.

> "You'd wear yourself down to a nub," snickered Vin.

> Chris reached across the table and moved Vin's glass of dark rum out of the young docker's reach as Ezra spluttered and blushed.

> "Ah didn't mean for services rendered!" protested Ezra.

> "Most of these fallen women don't have a home. They're on the streets selling themselves to pay for a half share of a bed for a few hours and maybe the odd hot meal. If you paid them any extra their pimps would take it all and force them back out on the streets," snapped Buck.

> "You seem to know a lot about it, Brother Buck," soothed Josiah.

> "Yes, yes I do," answered Buck.

> Vin sat up a little straighter in his chair and gripped Buck's arm by way of an apology for his earlier remarks.

> "A half share of a bed?" shuddered Ezra.

> "I could take Emily home with me once she'd paid her pimp and let her have my ma's bed," offered JD, "she wouldn't need to work...so...hard...I mean so long into the night."

> "I could take two ladies home with me and I'd offer to sleep on the floor," grinned Buck.

> "Chris could take Lydia and two more home," nodded Vin.

> "Chris could what?" Larabee's voice was deceptively low and controlled.

> "Hell, Chris, you take Lydia home regularly. You can rise to the occasion one more time!"

> "Ezra, could you take Li Pong back to your hotel with you?" interrupted Nathan before Chris could knock Vin off his chair.

> "Li Pong?" puzzled Ezra.

> "Li Pong is a young Chinese girl that works in a Limehouse opium den. I'm paying money every week until I've paid enough to buy her freedom from Canton Kitty so she allows me to take her for a stroll on my night off. I have to work tonight but I'd like to know she was safe. Canton Kitty will presume she spent the night with me."

> "You're buying yourself a Chinese slave girl?" asked a surprised Ezra.

> "No! How dare you accuse me of that! I'm buying her freedom nothing else! If I could pay Canton Kitty off tonight I would but I'm brassic."

> "Brassic?"

> "Boracic lint meaning skint, flat broke, without a pot to piss in or a window to throw it out of---"

> "Thank you for the timely explanation, Mr. Tanner."

> "Shame we ain't got an acquaintance with a fat wallet," drawled Vin, fixing Ezra with clear blue eyes.

> "Very well, here's the money you need to pay for her freedom and be assured a gentleman will not take advantage of the young lady," sighed Ezra, reaching inside his red jacket for his bulky wallet.

> "Well, I don't know any gentlemen so I guess I'll just have to trust you, Ezra. I owe you. Accept my sincere thanks," smiled Nathan reaching out to shake Ezra's hand.

> "I'm goin' home now," announced Vin in a loud voice, getting up out of his chair, staggering and grabbing the edge of the table.

> Larabee reached out to support the young docker.

> Clutching at Larabee's Astrakhan coat Vin hissed in his friend's ear. "We can't find rooms for 'em all so I'm goin' on that patrol."

> "No! You're too drunk!" remonstrated Chris.

> "Sober as a judge," winked Vin. "The women won't see me watching over them in the shadows."

> Chris watched his friend weave his unsteady way across the pub floor its clientèle seemingly unaware of the presence of just another drunkard. Chris still wasn't happy about his friend undertaking this mission even if Vin was actually stone cold sober but if anyone could remain undetected in the streets and alleyways it was Vin Tanner or perhaps the Whitechapel murderer himself.

> > **Sunday September 1888**

> "The Press is calling the Whitechapel murderer 'Jack the Ripper' since the 'Dear Boss' letter," explained JD.

> Gathered at their regular table in their usual public house six men perused Ezra's newspaper.

> "Women under pressure from their pimps are braving the streets all night again and declining our protection," said Ezra.

> "But Li Pong is safe?" Nathan asked of Ezra.

> "She has my hotel bedroom. Ah, sir, have made it plain to her that she is under no obligation and Ah continue to sleep in the dressing room."

> "But you do like her don't you?" asked Nathan.

> "Yes, very much," blushed Ezra.

> "Some of the ladies are away hop picking so at least they are safe for a while," explained Buck.

> "They will all be back soon enough but we can't force them to take our help," added Chris.

> "I'll keep up my nightwatch but I can't be everywhere at once," sighed a frustrated Vin. "I was watching over Catherine last night. I had a real bad feeling about her but she got taken up for drunkenness by Sergeant Byfield and locked up so I moved on to Nora. I was lucky to find an unlit doorway out of the heavy rain to watch over her. Didn't see Lydia on the streets, Cowboy," smiled Vin earning himself a glare from Chris.

> "I heard that the letter sent to the Central News Agency claimed that Jack the Ripper would clip the next girl's ears off!" said JD with relish.

> Buck gave JD a look that warned the youngster to curb his excited tone.

> "Sorry," mumbled JD, feeling ashamed.

> "Josiah! We've already got you a glass of porter!" Vin called as Josiah entered the pub.

> Josiah turned and headed in their direction but was pushed aside by Police Inspector Walter Bryce and a number of burly coppers.

> "Christopher Adam Larabee, you are under arrest for the murders of Catherine Eddowes---"

> "Ya had her locked up for the night!" roared a furious Vin.

> "Catherine Eddowes was released when deemed to be sober," snapped Inspector Bryce. "She was discovered murdered in Mitre Square approximately five hours after her arrest---"

> "Police Inspector Bryce, you said 'murders' please, elucidate," demanded Ezra.

> "If you people would stop interrupting me! I would! The body of one Elizabeth Stride, a known prostitute using the name 'Long Liz', was discovered at close to 1:00 am in Dutfield's Yard, off Berner Street in Whitechapel. Murdered while plying her trade no doubt and got what she deserved for selling her body---"

> "You can't prove that was what she was doin'," interjected Vin. "Long Liz already had sixpence she got from Elizabeth Tanner and money for a room that I gave her!"

> "Both women were seen in the company of a blond man just prior to their demise," added Inspector Bryce with a snide smile.

> Vin leapt to his feet sending his chair crashing over. "And of course Chris is the only blond man in London!"

> "Larabee, are you denying having ever been seen in the company of these women?"

> "I have bought these women the occasional drink and conversed with them in the street but I have never, would never, harmed a hair on their heads," swore Chris.

> Inspector Bryce ransacked the pockets of Larabee's long black coat. "Aha!" he cried. "No evidence you say? Grape stalks! We have a witness claiming to have sold Long Liz and a man grapes an hour before her murder! One of her handkerchiefs had grape juice stains on it. That's evidence in my book."

> The burly coppers seized Chris manacling his hands behind him and taking the tall blond outside to a Black Maria as Bryce stepped back drawing a Webley British Bulldog five shot revolver to cover the other six men as he exited the public house.

> "I'll arrange an attorney at law, a solicitor as you call them, for Mr. Larabee first thing in the morning," offered Ezra, shocked to the core. "More drinks? Doubles? I need a stiffener after that."

> "And we need to catch this killer!" growled Vin.

> "How? Brother Vin, how?" sighed Josiah.

> "Two entire police forces can't catch him," pointed out JD.

> Vin seemed distracted while he was watching Ezra walk back from the bar weaving in and out of the tables while balancing a tray of drinks without spilling a single drop.

> "Walks awful graceful don't he?" drawled Vin.

> > TBC


	4. Ezra Meets the Ripper

> **Ezra Meets the Ripper**

> > > **London 2nd October 1888**

> "The answer is no, Mr. Tanner!"

> "Ezra, we have to clear Chris Larabee's name!" remonstrated Vin.

> "They've had Chris locked up for days. Bryce and his cronies could keep Chris in jail for as long as they like, Ezra," said Buck.

> "They won't let him paint in there," pointed out Josiah.

> "When the sanctified dead rise from their graves Ah will wear that purple dress not before."

> "More Unfortunates are going to die in the most terrifying way." Nathan's face was a grim mask.

> "Aw hell," groaned Ezra.

> M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7

> "You need just a touch more rouge, Ezra, now you're the belle of the Ten Bells. Don't forget your new name is 'Esther Polly Stanhope'. Go sashay over there an' sit with Lydia an' Emily," grinned Buck.

> "Bona drag," snickered Vin.

> "What?" spluttered Ezra.

> "When they go walkin' the streets you go too, Ezra, I mean, Esther Polly Stanhope," said Vin.

> "I'll act as your pimp and negotiate with anyone wanting to hire your, ahem, services. From time to time one of us will negotiate a price and you'll disappear with them seemingly for a quick upright against a wall," instructed Buck.

> "Dear Lord! At least that explains why you are wearing that hideously patterned brown suit," sniffed Ezra.

> "Pot calling the kettle black there, Ezra," said Vin, eying the gaudy purple dress and black feather boa Ezra was wearing.

> Ezra patted his curly black wig in place and minced over to join the women at their table.

> > **London 8th November 1888**

> Ezra was clearly in a temper as he flounced into Chris Larabee's parlor. The designated place for Ezra to shed his fine feathers and complete his metamorphosis from Whitechapel streetwalker to Southern gentleman.

> Buck was clutching his sides with near hysterical laughter. "Ezra has a suitor," guffawed Buck.

> "This gawdawful little man kept pestering me!" complained Ezra.

> "He only wanted you to sing him a song, Ezra. You could have obliged him."

> "Over my dead body!"

> "He was willing to pay! Which was more than the any other punter wanted to do!"

> "Ah refuse to take part in this charade any longer!" insisted Ezra.

> "Ezra, ya say that every night," pointed out Vin.

> "It has been over a month, Mr. Tanner! Everyone in Whitechapel looks suspicious to me! How can we ever hope to catch the real murderer?"

> "Ezra has a point, we need a new plan. The more time passes without a sighting of the murderer the more guilty Chris looks." said Josiah.

> "We can't wish for another murder just to free Chris," argued Nathan.

> "Of course we don't! we just want to trap the murderer before he can kill again!" said Buck.

> "Ain't there no one that has aroused your suspicions?" prompted Vin.

> Buck and Ezra looked at each other.

> "The private detective," replied both men in unison.

> "Cyrus Poplar? He is convinced the murderer is "Leather Apron". He keeps questioning me," said Josiah.

> "There's something about him makes my hackles rise," agreed Buck.

> "I had words with him too," said Vin.

> "New plan, we follow Cyrus Poplar," announced Buck.

> "Agreed!" cheered Ezra.

> > **London Friday 9th November 1888**

> The six men gathered in Chris Larabee's front parlor were left reeling by the brutal murder of Mary Jane Kelly in her room at 13 Miller's Court just off Dorset Street, Spitalfields. The body was discovered at a quarter to eleven in the morning.

> "She let her murderer in?" asked Ezra.

> "There was a broken window with room enough for a hand to slip through and reach the lock on the door," sighed Buck.

> "The poor victim...I can't begin to tell you the bloody violence..." Nathan wiped his hand over his eyes wishing he could erase the gruesome image seared into his memory.

> "I'm going to get Chris out!" announced Vin.

> "Me too! They can't keep him incarcerated now!" seconded Buck.

> "Indeed they can't," agreed a voice from the parlor door.

> "Chris!" cried JD.

> The relief in the room was palpable.

> "Inspector Abberline released me at noon in spite of Bryce still objecting. I never want to see another blue lamp as long as I live," explained Chris. "Have we a suspect? What happened while I was locked up?"

> "Sit down," ordered Buck.

> Ezra ushered the blond into a deep buttoned, fireside chair.

> "Here." Vin pressed a large glass of excellent Scotch whisky into Larabee's hand. "We'll let Ezra explain."

> After Chris had been quite eloquently put in the picture with only minimal interruptions, he sat back in the chair and pondered some on the situation.

> "I would have wagered good money that they would have been getting in line to murder Ezra. Why didn't they?" was his first question. "Didn't Ezra deliberately put 'Esther Polly Stanhope' in harms way night after night? An open invitation to the murderer?"

> "But he was never seen in your company while dressed as a woman!" rasped Vin, immediately following Larabee's line of thought.

> "Yes! Every victim was in Mr. Larabee's company at some point!" said an excited JD.

> "Something that didn't escape Inspector Walter Bryce's notice. We have to credit him with that," agreed Josiah.

> "Yet 'Esther Polly Stanhope' didn't make an appearance until after Chris was arrested," nodded Buck.

> "When I've had a hot bath and slept in my own bed for an hour or two I'm taking 'Esther Polly Stanhope' here to the Ten Bells for a libation," announced Chris, unlocking the drawer containing his John Adams six shot pistol and pocketing it.

> "Why, Mr. Larabee," simpered Ezra fluttering his eyelashes.

> M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7

> "I want to get my hands on Saucy Jacky's neck real bad," growled Buck as the six men and Esther Polly Stanhope settled in at Larabee's usual table.

> Chris had waved JD over and the young man had brought drinks to the table and was proud to been offered a chair.

> "Why hasn't the Whitechapel Murderer tried to rip Lydia? I mean Chris has spent more time in her, um, company than any other..." asked JD.

> "Hezekiah Wickes. That's why. His men follow the Wickes girls all over Whitechapel making sure their customers pay up the moment they finish," answered Buck.

> "JD, bring another round of drinks over but replace the gin in both mine and Esther's glass with water. Keep serving water to us until we leave. We need to be fully alert but onlookers need to think that Esther is befuddled by drink," ordered Chris.

> "Leave?" questioned Ezra.

> "The Ripper won't try to murder you in here, Esther, we need to send you out on the streets," smirked JD.

> "O joy!" groused Ezra. "I'll wager it's raining too. It's always raining in this gawd awful place. They should rename it Rainopolis."

> "If I am the link between the victims then we need to be seen in each other's company in various places," pointed out Chris.

> M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7

> Some short time later Chris offered Esther his arm and the two men left the Ten Bells public house together. Stopping to buy piping hot roast chestnuts from the woman at the corner they perambulated the likes of Commercial Street. Visits were made to the Horn of Plenty and the Britannia public houses among others where they made sure that their jocular manner and excessively loud laughter got them noticed.

> As the hour grew late "Esther Polly Stanhope" walked the streets alone except for six other men hidden out of sight in unlit doorways and alleys.

> "This damn whalebone corset is killing me," hissed Ezra as he passed by Josiah's hiding place for the umpteenth time. "How much more walking do Ah need to do?"

> "You can rest your lallies soon," whispered Vin as Ezra tottered by.

> "Ah can't hardly see my hand in front of my face in this pea souper!" complained Ezra, referring to the thick yellowy fog by its London nickname.

> "Keep walking, Ezra, Whitechapel streetwalkers can be nicked by the coppers just for standing still," warned Buck.

> "Be sure to stop me before Ah walk into the dock," muttered Ezra.

> "Heads up, Ezra, you got company," warned Chris almost an hour later.

> A figure enveloped in a black opera cloak and top hat hurried along in Ezra's footsteps. Ezra knowing that he was being watched over slowed his pace and meandered down the fog shrouded street.

> Much to the watchers' surprise Ezra's follower slowed too. Ezra continued to walk and walk until he'd reached the docks and had more than enough of waiting for the mysterious stranger to make a move.

> "Looking for fun, dearie?" swinging his hips Ezra turned and challenged his human shadow.

> With a blood curdling scream and a gleam of sharp steel Ezra's life flashed before him as his attacker's blade struck his chest.

> "We've caught Jack the Ripper!" shouted JD.

> Immediately six men charged out of the murky darkness and seized the opera cloaked figure. Buck grabbed at the long knife and twisted it from the Ripper's hand.

> Vin knocked off the top hat and a shocked Chris took a step back as he recognized the face of the Ripper.

> "You? It's you! It can't be!" bellowed Chris.

> TBC


	5. The Ripper at Bay

 

> **The Ripper at Bay**

> Chris glared at the familiar face staring wild-eyed at them. "Ella? Ella Gaines?"

> "Seems like we've caught Jill the Ripper!" exclaimed a shocked JD.

> Chris retained a grip like grim death on Ella's wrists as Nathan and Josiah knelt on the floor and examined Ezra.

> "He's alive! I need to bring him round. Give him air!" announced Nathan as all but Chris gathered around their fallen comrade.

> "I have some brandy," offered Josiah.

> "He needs air," insisted Nathan. "Move back. Come on, Ezra, you ain't dead but I need to see those big green eyes!"

> "Not dead? How isn't he dead? She stabbed him!" cried JD.

> "She aimed for his chest and we padded his corset too well for the knife to do more than bruise him. Ezra, talk to me. You're alive! Talk to me!" demanded Nathan. "I said move back damn ya he needs air."

> "I have some brandy," repeated Josiah.

> "Wait! He's trying to say something," said JD.

> "Ezra? Ezra? What is it?" asked Nathan.

> "Josiah...listen to Josiah..." gasped Ezra.

> "There's nothing wrong with him he just wants the brandy!" declared Buck.

> "Thank God! You gave me a real scare, son." Josiah unscrewed the silver hip flask and batting away the Southerner's hands gave Ezra just a few reviving sips of the spirits.

> "You followed me across the sea? Why? What did you do? Tell me, Ella," began Chris.

> "They were whores, Chris, all of them! And Sarah Larabee was the biggest harlot of them all! She never loved you like I love you!"

> "What the hell?" growled Chris, totally taken aback.

> "I sent her back to hell, darling, I hurled them all down into the inferno!" Ella couldn't keep the smug expression off her face.

> "All of them?" Buck asked carefully in a gentle tone. "Both Sarah and Adam? And all the whores? All five here in Whitechapel?"

> "Yes! Of course you don't understand. I had to save Chris! That bitch Sarah and those whores were dragging him down into hell! By killing them all I saved him."

> "You? You killed my beloved Sarah? My precious Adam?" Chris couldn't believe what he was hearing.

> "Darling! We can be together forever now! You and I!" Ella cried jubilantly.

> "Ella." Chris spoke in a voice so icy cold that it made the six men listening shiver. "You and I will never be together. You ripped out my heart when you killed my Sarah and Adam. Sarah is the only woman I will ever love even if I live for another thousand years!"

> Even in her madness Ella Gaines could see the murderous rage welling up in Chris Larabee. Wriggling free from an enraged Chris, a terrified Ella made her escape, running off into the impenetrable London fog.

> "Grab her!" yelled Buck as they tore after her.

> "Stop!" rasped Vin at the top of his voice, "Y'all end up drowned in the dock basin!"

> As if to prove Vin's words were true a loud splash was heard. Six men ran and one man in a purple dress limped to the edge of the dock. Josiah shone his bullseye lantern over the inky waters but saw nothing.

> "Vin, how deep is it---? Chris!" yelled Buck.

> "My gawd! He's gone in after her!" shouted JD.

> "No!" cried out Nathan.

> "Naw!" echoed Vin.

> "Can anyone see him?" wheezed Ezra, clutching his bruised chest.

> "We need a rope!" decided Buck. "Where's Vin?"

> "Mr. Tanner ran that way," pointed Ezra, "with JD."

> JD came running back minutes later with a length of rope.

> "Look! There he is!" said Buck as Chris struggled to the surface only to disappear back under the water. "Leave her, Chris, it's too deep!"

> "Dear Lord," said Nathan.

> Josiah was too busy muttering prayers to every deity he could think of.

> "JD, tie the rope off and get ready to throw the rope in," ordered Buck.

> "Vin said to wait," explained JD.

> "Well, Vin ain't here, boy."

> "He is now," said Ezra.

> The men scattered as the carriage drew up and Vin jumped down from the driver's seat. Vin snatched the rope out of JD's hands and commenced tying it to the carriage.

> "What the hell?" snapped Buck.

> "Chris ain't coming out 'til he finds that bitch's body. He's gonna be exhausted we need to ready the horses to help pull him out," growled Vin, scanning the water.

> Ezra was eying the carriage. "Excuse me, Mr. Tanner. This carriage has a royal crest on the door."

> Vin briefly fixed Ezra with an icy stare.

> "Mr. Tanner, the all black carriage horses, they are Friesian are they not?"

> "Ezra?"

> "Yes, Mr. Tanner?"

> "Shut the hell up."

> "CHRIS!" yelled Buck.

> "Fool is going to freeze to death," warned Nathan.

> "Can anyone see him?" asked Josiah shining the bullseye lantern over the depths again.

> "There!" pointed Vin.

> Chris looked around unsure as to where in the water he was exactly.

> "CHRIS!" Buck tried to attract his friend's attention.

> Josiah signaled by swinging his lamp to and fro.

> "Grab the rope!" shouted JD.

> Chris didn't respond.

> "Aw hell!" rasped Vin as he jumped into the freezing water with the end of the rope.

> "Now I'll have two idiots to nurse!" complained Nathan.

> "What about me?" huffed Ezra.

> "You're not an idiot you're a very brave man," replied Nathan, absentmindedly patting Ezra on the shoulder.

> "Here, Chris, take the rope," urged Vin.

> "I've got her, Vin. S-s-she will have to stand t-trial." Chris' teeth were chattering with the cold.

> "She's dead, Chris. You need to let go or you'll drown too. Take the rope, please."

> "Dead?"

> "Deader than a beaver hat."

> Chris took the rope and allowed the men and horses waiting on the dock to pull him up.

> Vin dragged Ella's body over to the end of the rope when it was lowered back down for him and tied her to it. Protesting bitterly, the men heaved on the rope for a second time. Vin understood that for his peace of mind Chris needed to see for himself that Ella Gaines was indeed dead.

> When Vin was pulled up onto the dock. Ella's dead body was on the ground.

> "Throw her back in," snarled Vin.

> "We need her body to prove that Chris is innocent," argued JD.

> "All it proves is she's another dead woman. She can't clear Chris now she's drowned herself," explained Buck.

> "She should have paid for her crimes," JD said.

> "The bitch is dead. They couldn't hang her seven times. Dead is dead," said Vin.

> "Can you get rid of the body, Vin?" asked Chris.

> "Yes," answered Vin. "I know a man that keeps pigs."

> "Wrap the knife she used on Ezra in the opera cloak and leave it along with the top hat arranged on the edge of the dock. Perhaps the Metropolitan Police will think 'Jack the Ripper' drowned himself. They don't need to know it was a woman doing the killing," ordered Chris.

> The men solemnly agreed.

> M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7 M7

> Six men watched as Vin left in the carriage.

> "Let's get you and Ezra home and in front of a warm fire, Chris," suggested Nathan.

> "Scotch," muttered Chris.

> "Brandy," said Ezra.

> "Sounds good," agreed JD.

> "Hot milk for you, my boy," grinned Buck.

> "And for Vin too but with a generous dash of Lamb's Navy rum," laughed Josiah.

> **London Saturday 10th November 1888**

> Seven men were relaxing in the Ten Bells public house when Inspector Frederick Abberline of Scotland Yard joined them at their usual table.

> "Drink?" offered JD.

> "No, thank you, contrary to popular belief I never drink on duty."

> "Then how can we help you?" asked Ezra.

> "Gentlemen, I have a very perplexing witness statement. Several hours after Mary Kelly was presumed to have died someone wearing her clothes was apparently seen outside the Britannia pub on the corner of Dorset Street, Spitalfields. If I suggested to you that Jack the Ripper might in fact have been Jill the Ripper what would you say?" asked Abberline.

> "Nothing that happens in Whitechapel would surprise me," answered Chris.

> "If I told you that the Metropolitan Police are no longer actively pursuing the Whitechapel murderer, what would you say?"

> "I would say that they are saving a lot of time and money that otherwise would be wasted."

> "I see." Inspector Abberline looked Chris Larabee straight in the eye for a full minute before he placed his chair back under the table and turned to leave. "You have my sincere thanks, gentlemen. It is sad that your part in this case will never be known but I myself will always think of you as  _The Magnificent Seven._

> **Epilogue**

> **London 1 st December 1888**

> "Chris! Have you seen the headline in the evening newspaper?"

> "No, JD."

> " _Police Hunt The Whitechapel Vampire!"_

> **THE END**

**Author's Note:**

> Copper, Peeler, Rozzer........Police Officer  
> Tanner...............................a six penny piece silver in color  
> Hansom cab.......................a horse drawn carriage for hire  
> Growler.............................a horse drawn carriage for hire larger than a Hansom cab  
> Docker...............................longshoreman  
> Costermonger....................supplier of fruit and vegetables  
> Donkey Stone....................an abrasive scouring block for cleaning stone steps  
> Pea souper.........................a frequent thick yellow fog.  
> Pavement...........................a stone flagged sidewalk  
> Pub, Public House..............Bar  
> Beak..................................Judge  
> Black Maria.......................horse drawn van for transporting prisoners


End file.
